Warren Mayor Jim Fouts says excessive Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests have become a burden on city government.

Fouts told the Detroit News that three people, including City Councilman Mark Liss, have made 148 FOIA requests since the beginning of February.

Sept. 7, Detroit News: The mayor said research for the requests is adding to the daily workloads of a number of city departments.

"Where and when this 'FOIA frenzy' will end is anyone's guess, but the bottom line is city government operations are being seriously disrupted and city employees' time that should be spent servicing the needs of Warren residents is being spent on FOIAs that are absurd and clearly politically motivated," he said.

"The public has 'a right to know' what its governments are doing with their tax dollars, but asking for information on wastebasket contents, restroom usage and concert tickets is clearly ridiculous."

Of course the intent of sunshine laws like FOIA is to err on the side of transparency, and FOIA experts say Fouts shouldn’t be so quick to dismiss these requests as frivolous.

“While it seems weird to request the contents of a trash can, the reality is that the documents people throw away can result in significant revelations about the operations of government,” said Todd Heywood, a senior reporter at the Michigan Messenger. Heywood testified before a state House committee on FOIA reform earlier this year.

Warren can decline a request for information that doesn’t meet FOIA guidelines. In other words, neither Mark Liss nor anyone else can FOIA information about whether or not Jim Fouts went to a concert on his own dime, but it isn't "clearly ridiculous," as Fouts asserts, to ask if Warren is buying concert tickets with public money.

The concern about access to public information prompted some journalists, politicians and activists to form the Michigan FOIA Coalition.

“The Warren situation shows once again how important transparency is, and how government is often fighting between transparency and privacy rights,” said Heywood. “However, we know that Michigan's law has so many loopholes now, that rather than going for the transparency -- as the law requires -- government seeks the most restrictive responses possible. That's why a coalition of media, government officials, political operatives and special interest groups are banding together to form the Coalition. This is about helping each other, and government, to be transparent.”

To answer Fouts’ question about when the “FOIA frenzy” ends, it doesn’t. That’s the point.